[Illustration:  Now and then they spoke, but so softly that the boys could not hear what was said]

CHAPTER VIII

THE MYSTERIOUS AUTO

They awoke then, alarmed and confused, and stared with sleepy eyes at the white radiance which, entering door and window, showed with startling detail the bare walls of their refuge.  Even as they looked the light vanished and, by contrast, the darkness seemed blacker than ever.

“Awake, Amy?” whispered Clint.

“Yes.  Say, what the dickens was that?”

“I don’t know.  Listen!”

From somewhere not far away came the steady purring of a motor car.  Their minds didn’t work very quickly yet, and it was fully a minute before Clint exclaimed:  “An auto!  Then we must be near the road!”

He scrambled to his feet and crept, unsteadily because of chilled limbs, to the doorway.  Amy followed.  At first there was nothing to be seen.  The night was still cloudy.  But the sound of the running motor reached them distinctly, and, after a minute of strained peering into the darkness, they made out a line of trees against the sky.  Apparently there was a road between them and the trees and the automobile was in the road.  But no lights showed from it.

“Do you suppose,” whispered Amy, “it’s that fellow looking for us?”

“No, but maybe, whoever it is, he will give us—­”

Clint’s whisper stopped abruptly.  A light flashed a few yards away, such an illumination as might be from a pocket electric lamp, and a voice broke the stillness.  Clint grasped Amy’s arm, warning to silence.  Footsteps crossed the ground toward the hut.

Again the light flashed, but this time its rays were directed toward the ground and showed two pairs of legs and something that looked like a stout stick.  Then it went out again and the footsteps stopped.  The two men, whoever they were and whatever they were doing, remained some twenty feet from the watchers at the door.  Now and then they spoke, but so softly that the boys could not hear what was said.  Neither could they determine what the other sound was that reached them.  It seemed almost as though the men were scuffing about the ground, and the absurd notion that they had lost something and were seeking it occurred to both.  But to look for anything in the dark when there was a light at hand was too silly, and that explanation was discarded.  For fully ten minutes—­it seemed much longer to the shivering pair in the doorway—­the motor chugged and the men continued their mysterious occupation.  Amy’s teeth were chattering so that Clint squeezed his arm again.  Then the light again flashed, swept the ground for an instant and was as suddenly shut off, and the footsteps retreated.